


My most beautiful love story is you

by Mimisempai



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Declaration of Love, Fluff, Getting Together, Hugging, Kissing, M/M, Sonny gives it all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:34:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28325415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mimisempai/pseuds/Mimisempai
Summary: How do you tell someone you love them?How do you tell someone you love them when you know you could be rejected?How should he tell Barba that he loved him?Sonny can no longer keep quiet and decides it's time to dare to go all in. What will be his reward?
Relationships: Rafael Barba/Dominick "Sonny" Carisi Jr.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 35





	My most beautiful love story is you

**Author's Note:**

> That's it for this year!  
> Thank you for all those who have supported me since I started "writing". I know that I still have a loooooot of progress to make. But it's exciting and I still have so much to say about these two. See you next year!

How do you tell someone you love them?

How do you tell someone you love them when you know you could be rejected?

How should he tell Barba that he loved him? Sonny wondered, for the hundredth time.

How does he tell Barba that he loves him after months of more or less sarcastic exchange, months of stormy collaboration, then months of secret admiration, and finally weeks of total adoration?

Sonny had spent half of the day lurking around 1 Hogan Place, behind a newspaper now well worn and crumpled every time it seemed that Barba could see him.

Now it was dark, and Carmen had left the office twenty minutes ago. Barba was about to do the same, and Sonny could see him putting his things away through the glass door. He still didn't have the courage to enter the office, which he had done successfully many times before that fateful day.

Sonny was absolutely sure of this, he just knew that if he didn't do it now, he would never do it. This was the typical "now or never" situation. But how to do that. In fact, he needed to say it, because he had the feeling that Rafael felt something too.

Taking a deep breath, Sonny put his hand on the doorknob, closed his eyes and practically burst into the office, stumbling over the threshold and almost slumping on the carpet.

Great, what a delicate way to announce his arrival, Sonny thought. With his eyes still closed, Sonny stood a few feet from the door, breathing weakly and rapidly. The silent office. He heard nothing, nothing but Barba breathing quietly, too quietly, and too cautiously, like a predator waiting. 

Sonny took a deep breath and opened his eyes. Barba was standing closer to Sonny than he expected. Sonny was greeted by Barba's piercing gaze, which sank deep inside him, who had understood and denied everything before Sonny even had a chance to speak. 

They continued to look at each other in silence, none of them wanting to be the first to break it for fear of the words that would fill him.

Then Sonny, as always, pronounced the first words. They didn't come out as he wanted, but it was still a beginning.

"Counselor, I..." His voice failed him, he felt stupid and dumb, all his years and experience disappearing as if they never happened to him, as if he was a teenager again, confessing his love for the first time.

Sonny had never been afraid of Barba before. But right now he was completely terrified of what Barba might say to him after hearing Sonny's confession. But it would only matter if Sonny could produce other words.

He cleared his throat and tried again. "Counselor, I..." He stopped again, this time not because of himself, but because of Barba's hand raised in front of him. "Carisi... Sonny, stop. Sonny, stop. Please." Barba's eyes were stern but his voice was filled with a feeling that Sonny could not quite decipher now. Barba's own face was tense, as if he didn't like what was going to happen.

It was so rare he called Sonny by his first name that Sonny smiled faintly, a shy but happy smile. Barba backed away as if he had been hit. Sonny saw it and felt it, but against all expectations, this reaction from Barba actually gave Sonny proof that he was not wrong, that what he meant was also true for Barba.

Sonny took a step forward. Barba took a step backwards.

Sonny now saw it so clearly that he was surprised that he hadn't realized it earlier. Barba, Rafael, was afraid, afraid of him, of Sonny and of himself, and of this strange unknown feeling that they both seemed to have, but which they did not want to acknowledge, neither to themselves nor to the other.

But this is no longer the case. Sonny was going to see to it. He took another step forward. Barba took a step back. Sonny's lips curled again in a small smile. It was ridiculous. This dance was ridiculous. 

"Rafael".

The man visibly flinched when Sonny said his name. Sonny continued, however, knowing that it was not out of disgust. Sonny deliberately used the man's first name, establishing once and for all, after a very long time, a possible and appropriate way to address the man to whom he was about to confess his love.

"Rafael, I have to tell you something." Sonny desperately hoped that his voice was firm and confident and that it conveyed the urgency he felt in his heart.

"Carisi... Sonny, I know. I know what you want to say." Rafael couldn't decide which of Sonny's names to use. "You don't have to say it. In fact, you shouldn't say it at all, or be here at all, for that matter." 

Sonny stepped forward. Rafael took a step back. It was the last step he could take. Rafael was now leaning against his desk. He could no longer escape.

"No. I have to say it, and you have to listen to it. And we have to stop pretending that it doesn't exist."

Sonny took a step forward. Rafael put his hands on the desk behind him, as if he was preparing for an imminent attack.

Sonny smiled softly and tilted his head to the side. "I think there's something pretty special between us, and I think it can be even more special. If you let it be." Sonny added gently.

Rafael looked at Sonny with bright eyes, his fingers gripping the edge of the desk. Sonny walked the distance between them again in two long strides. He was now right in front of Rafael, his chest almost touching Rafael.

Sonny touched Rafael's cheek with his fingertips and the man closed his eyes as he exhaled with a shiver. "Rafael, what are you so afraid of?"

Rafael's eyes opened.

"You". Rafael exhaled the word, his voice was barely audible. "You, that you'll leave once you see that I'm not what you hope for."

Dazed, Sonny takes Rafael's face in his hands and pressed his forehead against Rafael's. "Rafael. No." He whispered against the lips of the man he hadn't kissed yet. "Never."

Rafael smiled sadly. "You don't know that. You can't know it now. You're blinded by what you feel, by this silly admiration, by the image you have of me and you can't know if it's going to work." His words were so desperate and heartbreaking that Sonny immediately wanted to find a way to show Rafael their future, in a year, five, ten and more, where they will be together, happy, always with this thing they are trying so desperately to express right now.

But all Sonny could do was use words. He stepped back a little to see Rafael's eyes: "I know. Please believe me. I know. I know."

"How?"

Sonny smiled and shrug his shoulders. "I just know."

Rafael closed his eyes and shook his head in Sonny's hands. "You are still young, and passionate, and impulsive, and beautiful. And I'm too old and too jaded for that. I'm too old to be heartbroken." 

Rafael whispered so softly that Sonny barely heard him. He didn't expect something so sentimental from a man as reserved and composed as Rafael.

Sonny caressed Rafael's cheekbones with his thumbs. "You're not old." He lowered his face and did something he had been dreaming of doing for some time. He gently kissed the corner of Rafael's mouth. 

Rafael gasped and his lips separated a little. Sonny continued, his lips never completely leaving the place where he had just been kissed. "I will never break your heart. I will cherish it and cherish it with all my being, if you let me."

Sonny drops his head on Rafael's shoulder, his hands slide over Rafael's shoulders. "I'd rather break my own heart." Sonny took a deep breath of Rafael's scent. Rafael's hands touched Sonny's waist. It was light and hesitant, Rafael's hands barely touching Sonny's flanks. Even through layers of clothing, Sonny could feel the warmth of Rafael's palms. Sonny slowly slid his hands up to Rafael's waist and gently wrapped his arms around him, as if he was afraid Rafael would run away at any moment.

Rafael's grip on Sonny's waist tightened. They were now standing in the middle of the office, and Sonny thought he was the happiest person in the world. 

Sonny could feel Rafael exhaling deeply, he could feel almost all the tension escaping from Rafael and dissolving into the air. 

Rafael pouted and kissed Sonny again. Sonny laughed and put his forehead against his own. "Tontito." Sonny finally smiled and whispered the three words that he had intended to say from the very beginning of that strange evening.

This time Rafael did not interrupt him. He simply held Sonny more firmly and pressed his lips against Sonny's temple. The silence of the office was only disturbed by their breathing. 

And now Sonny knew the exact answer to his old dilemma: how do you tell someone you love them? You say it with your heart, with your kisses, with every act, every movement and every breath, with every molecule of your being.

And you get the same thing in return.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you Sarah for the beta ! <3


End file.
